Rubio response hits Obama on taxes, spending after State of the Union

Sen. Marco Rubio delivered a forceful argument for the Republican agenda for the middle class Tuesday night, contrasting his party’s vision for economic prosperity with President Barack Obama’s call for a more robust federal government.

In his bilingual response to the State of the Union address, infused with personal anecdotes as a child of immigrants, Rubio depicted the GOP as the party who would best advocate for a free-enterprise economy, generate economic growth and ultimately lift the middle class.

Text Size

Rubio can't stand the heat during GOP rebuttal

POLITICO LIVE: House GOP embraces Rubio

Marco Rubio’s greatest hits

“Presidents in both parties – from John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan – have known that our free enterprise economy is the source of our middle class prosperity,” Rubio said in his response, at times delivered cautiously and interrupted once for a drink of water. “But President Obama? He believes it’s the cause of our problems.”

While Obama touted his view of a “smarter government” to work on behalf of the middle class, Rubio repeatedly drove the message that the president wanted to expand the presence of the federal government in people’s lives — much to the nation’s detriment, the senator argued.

“More government isn’t going to help you get ahead. It’s going to hold you back,” Rubio said. “More government isn’t going to create more opportunities. It’s going to limit them.”

Delivering the official GOP response to Obama’s speech, Rubio aimed to rebut criticisms that the Republican Party was a party for just the wealthy, noting that he still lived in the working-class south Florida neighborhood where he was raised and that he had only recently paid off the more than $100,000 in student loans he accrued in school. As the son of a man who worked as a bartender and a woman who was a cashier and maid, Rubio noted that he didn’t inherit money from his parents — but instead earned an opportunity to achieve the loftiest of dreams.

The tax increases espoused by Obama would only “hurt” the middle class, Rubio said — costing them raises, benefits and potentially their jobs. In sharp jabs at the president, Rubio accused Obama of “falsely” attacking motives of those who disagreed with him — on anything from environmental policies to health care programs to the sequester.

The Republican rebuttal to the State of the Union has showcased top figures for the party in recent years, such as House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the GOP’s vice presidential nominee in 2012. Rubio — the Republican Party’s most prominent Hispanic politician — is considered to be among the GOP’s top contenders for president in 2016, and his rapid rise in politics and oratory talents mirror that of another former senator: Obama himself.